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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26979460">Iphigenia in Uijeongbu</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/stateofintegrity/pseuds/stateofintegrity'>stateofintegrity</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>MASH (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Attempted Sexual Assault, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 22:00:26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,088</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26979460</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/stateofintegrity/pseuds/stateofintegrity</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Follows the episode "No Laughing Matter." Klinger tries to bargain with Baldwin and gets in over his head.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Maxwell Klinger/Charles Emerson Winchester III</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Iphigenia in Uijeongbu</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Maxwell Q. Klinger, Corporal, couturier, and all around overworked jack-of-all-trades, wanted out of Korea with every breath he took - as well as with all of the breaths terror suspended until his lungs, vetoing such deprivation, </span>
  <em>
    <span>screamed</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he knew someone who wanted out even more than he. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Maxwell was an animal pacing its zoo cage, knowing its boundaries, feeling the bars eating into its skin close as stripes, then Winchester was the type of creature that would chew through the tendons of its own foot to escape. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d seen the man render himself unfit through a flirtation with amphetamines, drink himself blind, and engage in behavior that was dangerously close to suicidal. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That he had seen all these things because Charles was the thing he liked to watch best… well, that didn’t change the fact that Korea was going to kill the proud, lonely man if he didn’t get out. Klinger’s love might be unspoken, unguessed, unknown, and unrequited - but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try to help the object of his affection. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>When he heard Potter and Winchester verbally duking it out over the impending arrival of Colonel Horace Baldwin, the classy clerk sprang into action, detaining Charles to advise him as to what course he should take. Winchester lashed him with a voice abrasive enough to strip his fatigues off - if not his skin, but Klinger held his course. Charles bulldozed over him, of course, announcing his intentions to plan the perfect murder. Klinger wondered if Major Houlihan would see clear to locking up all the syringes until Baldwin was gone… </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t give up, of course. If Charles’ pride was such that </span>
  <em>
    <span>he</span>
  </em>
  <span> couldn’t debase himself and suck up to Baldwin - well, he’d do it for him. As a mere Corporal in a camp full of officers and doctors (who weren’t exactly known for being humble) Klinger was used to getting on his knees to get some consideration (in fact, he had gold, glittery knee pads for just that purpose). </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles surprised him, however, when he introduced him as the “esteemed company clerk,” and behaved as a perfect gentleman. He even managed to stage whisper a compliment, offering, “That’s my boy, sir,” proud that Charles had chosen to take him up on his advice about tact and diplomacy. Charles answered prettily enough when he took the Colonel’s bags, nodding to him with a, “Good girl, Max,” that left him weak at the knees. The Major was the only one (except for the Colonel) who ever referred to him with the occasional female pronoun. Klinger both loved and hated this because he had never learned to bear it well. He nearly lost his hold on the luggage when he realized that this might be the last time he heard it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maxwell had known that liberating Winchester meant </span>
  <em>
    <span>missing</span>
  </em>
  <span> Winchester, of course. Terribly. And even if he chose to write to the man (he wouldn’t; he’d be too afraid that his spelling would offend the better educated man), he was sure Charles would want to put the 4077th behind him. At least he knew it was true love this time rather than the kid stuff courtship he’d had with Laverne. Wasn’t this the truest test? He loved Charles enough to let him go - and he would be happy about his going, happy for him, even if it made his own day to day that much more bleak, frightening, and lonely. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>From the disgust reigning over Winchester’s features like a storm, Maxwell was able to easily surmise that things weren’t going well regarding Project Tokyo Rose. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Don’t you worry about a thing, baby, </span>
  </em>
  <span> he thought, addressing the Major in thought as he never would in reality. </span>
  <em>
    <span>There’s plenty of stuff I don’t know how to do. I’m not a fancy surgeon. I can’t understand the books you read. I’ve never been to a symphony. But wheedle an officer into a favor? No problem. I’ve had bigger brass than Baldwin eating outta my hand before - and this time I’m doing it for you. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Even in thought, he didn’t dare add, “for my man.” Winchester would never be </span>
  <em>
    <span>his</span>
  </em>
  <span> anything. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>If Klinger hadn’t known it from the start, practically by </span>
  <em>
    <span>instinct</span>
  </em>
  <span>, then Charles had made it very clear when his darling baby sister had gotten engaged to an Italian. Klinger had known that his class status and lack of education were against him, but it seemed his native tongue, culture, and immigration status weren’t acceptable either. It was typical of the sweet young man that he responded to this by thinking that it was too bad, really. He knew he’d be good </span>
  <em>
    <span>to</span>
  </em>
  <span> Charles; he thought he might be good </span>
  <em>
    <span>for</span>
  </em>
  <span> him, too, could loosen him up a little. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For now, the best he could do was try to get the Major back to the sort of place where he could be happy; at least he’d get to see the man smile before he went. Maybe Potter would even let him drive him to the plane. It would give him a chance to say the things he felt. Then he shook his head at the notion. What would be the point? Winchester wouldn’t reciprocate. Why mess up the last time they’d be together with a bunch of badly put words that the Major wouldn’t want? Realizing that he was counting his chickens before the henhouse had even been built, Klinger steeled himself to go talk to the Colonel. The pretext of dropping something off at the VIP tent made a convenient cover and when Baldwin heard his proposition, he perked right up. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unluckily for Klinger, Baldwin wasn’t interested in the usual swag he used to beg and barter. Instead, he chucked the Corporal’s chin up and admired his very dark, very young eyes. “Shall we say 2330 hours, my dear?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Klinger thought about the wife he’d never held in the dark because they’d married over the radio. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thought of the teasing pinches he received in Post Op, the fumbled touches he’d spent two years ducking out of, escaping. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thought of Henry Blake complimenting his dresses, of Hawkeye propositioning him without even any sugar to even coat the words. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he thought of Charles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He thought of those eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was a hell of a way to say, “love you, Major,” he reflected. Charles would never hear him. He’d never even know. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The man wasn’t worth it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Everybody on the base would agree. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Everybody except me</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He nodded at the Colonel, stepping into the noose. Charles already had his heart. What did it matter if he sacrificed the rest? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Baldwin’s voice followed him back into the sunlight. “General Imbre was always partial to you in lilac, Corporal.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hadn’t Charles told him, once, that lilac was a mourning color? </span>
  <em>
    <span>Kinda fitting</span>
  </em>
  <span>. “I’ll see what I can do, Colonel,” he said, and left sure of his choice. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>***</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maxwell felt decidedly </span>
  <em>
    <span>less </span>
  </em>
  <span>sure about things when he found himself on his back, hands bound above his head. He hadn’t thought the Colonel was this kind of guy. Worst of all, he was running out of faith, now, that he could pretend the body that was about to be stretched out over his was Charles’. The Major, he was sure of it, would have been tender with him, watched out for him. This, well, this was a transaction, and the best Max could hope for was that it was a fast one. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Or so he thought. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The sound of his dress being torn, a dramatic slit opened over one trembling thigh, was still on the air when the door opened and relief expanded his lungs as effectively as an adrenaline shot. His eyes flicked to the figure crossing the threshold - beseeching without meaning to be - and the Major’s words of greeting cut off like a needle ripped off of a record. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What in the hell is going on here!?” </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>No, baby</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t mean or want to think it, but Max still </span>
  <em>
    <span>did</span>
  </em>
  <span> and he hated that so beautiful a voice, Atlantic ocean having quite eroded and erased the r’s, could contain such pain and anger… over him. It was like a vision of Hell bred inside a rose blossom - an incongruous, terrible beauty. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Go, Major. Go and it’ll be over in twenty minutes or forty minutes or an hour and then you really can </span>
  </em>
  <b>
    <em>go</em>
  </b>
  <em>
    <span>, all the way back to Tokyo and clean sheets and a real OR and good food and music… Just pretend you didn’t see. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>After that, Max couldn’t actually hear what Charles was saying… His ears buzzed as swarms of dark-winged things settled over him; his vision tried to swim but settled for going under. When it returned, plagued by flashes and some nifty fragmentation, Baldwin and his luggage had vanished. His skin felt wickedly cold. There was some commotion with Colonel Potter, some raised voices, Captain Pierce coyote-howling over the PA as his joke drought ended, and somewhere in there Charles must have gotten him loose. He hated the idea of missing that… but he did remember an arm around his waist, Charles escorting him, shaken, skirt torn, back to his tent, like a Cinderella whose ball had gotten a little rough. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>And then Maxwell was inside again. His hands shook as he changed, failed seductress into scared Corporal in soft, gender-appropriate (if rarely worn) clothing, and he sat on the edge of his cot, waiting for someone to yell at him for being so very, very stupid. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max was still shivering when he realized that he was no longer sitting alone anymore; the Major was speaking to him in low tones as he rubbed something into the marks on his thin wrists and covered them in cloth and he was answering, somehow, assuring him that Baldwin had only had time to pin his wrists and tear his dress a little. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Forgive me, Maxwell. It seems that my original instinct toward murder was, indeed, the correct one.” He wanted to grip the younger man’s hand but refrained. “If he had done more, Max, Potter assures me that he would have given me permission, too.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Klinger tilted his head. He was exhausted and cold and his body kept reminding him how narrowly he’d escaped. When it did, his teeth clacked together. His eyes kept being drawn to the ruined dress. “Could you maybe help me put that in the stove?” he asked. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles had never heard the Corporal so quiet. He knew that it was shock. Pierce had wanted Klinger in post op to observe him but Charles had interceded with Potter. Of all of them except the CO, whom Klinger regarded as a father, Charles was the closest to the young man. He’d found him, too. Adding other witnesses might frighten him worse. Charles had won the fight. Potter had gone to the phone to assure Baldwin’s demotion (if not arrest; </span>
  <em>
    <span>that</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Potter opined, would have focused too much attention on their kid Corporal and his gowns) and the Major was here to set to rights what he could. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The dress was a small thing. Bundling it into a tight was of cloth, he passed it into the flames and slammed the door on its cremation. Klinger sighed, relieved that it was gone. He’d never had good luck with that color. Laverne had accepted his proposal in such a dress. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then he seemed to register Charles - those eyes, his height, the thin lips he just knew would fit perfectly on his and which were going to be wasted on some uptown gal who would for sure dress worse than him - for the first time. “I, uh, thanks for getting me outta that mess, Major.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles couldn’t stand this. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He forgot he was a physician. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d never felt like much of an officer anyway, so that part was easy to ignore. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Which left what? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Just the proud, lonely, trapped man that Klinger had tried to set free. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>That man had never had a best friend before. He’d never wanted to frame another’s face and search the eyes for pain that he vowed to banish, or card his fingers in soft hair (he’d always envied Maxwell that thick mop, its tendency to fall over one eye) or bodily haul another being into his lap until his bulk (a source of shame and discomfort, usually) became a shield. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t look like that,” Klinger said from inside the protective circle of his arms, a place he never wished to leave but knew he could never, ever earn. “It was my fault, Major.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles made a sound of pure disgust. “Maxwell, it could not possibly have been your fault.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It would have been better, Klinger knew, to let him believe that. But he was honest to a fault, so he admitted that when the Colonel had propositioned him, he’d said yes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles went ghost pale - a color Klinger had never even seen in lace. His voice was a low howl. “Why would you agree to so debased a thing?!” </span>
  <em>
    <span>You idiot. You </span>
  </em>
  <b>
    <em>child</em>
  </b>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p><span>Klinger</span> <em><span>really </span></em><span>didn’t think he deserved to be scolded. He pushed back from the taller man. “You can go, sir, if you’re gonna get mad at me.” Tears welled in his eyes. “I can’t handle it right now, okay?”</span></p><p>
  <span>Charles sighed. “I am not angry, Maxwell. Not at you.” He really didn’t want to go. Not until he knew the young Corporal was as okay as he could be. He would stay all night long if needed. Those bandages were going to need to be checked in the morning anyway. “I assume… I assume this was in service of your escape from here, yes?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He couldn’t believe, not even for a second, that Max had </span>
  <em>
    <span>wanted</span>
  </em>
  <span> the man; he’d seen his eyes. His long, pale fingers clenched. He indulged in the fantasy of having Baldwin’s body laid out on a hospital bed, indulged in the dream of twining those fingers around the bastard’s heart and yanking it out. What kind of monster took advantage of a boy Corporal in a dress? He shivered as the sight of those crossed, bound wrists flashed into his mind. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Escape, yeah.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles heard something worrisome in the gap between the words. Klinger had only </span>
  <em>
    <span>danced</span>
  </em>
  <span> with generals… and he hadn’t seemed more desperate lately. There was more to this. But his friend was cold and shaken; he could wait. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Max…” he almost said, “Maxie,” said it, sometimes, in his thoughts. “May I… I would like to stay. Here. Tonight. With you. Would that be acceptable?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maxwell made a soft, sobbing sound. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Acceptable, Major? It’s what I dream about, baby. </span>
  </em>
  <span>“Yeah, sure. Whatever you want. I’m okay though. You don’t have to.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he did. He </span>
  <em>
    <span>had to</span>
  </em>
  <span>. His oath demanded it. And he didn’t ask permission to gather Max to him </span>
  <em>
    <span>again</span>
  </em>
  <span> and lay down with him held tight in his arms. He didn’t ask permission to touch his hair, either. He’d always known that Max was not just part woman and part man - he was part cat. He </span>
  <em>
    <span>loved</span>
  </em>
  <span> to be touched. Whether he wanted to or not, pretty Maxwell rose up into the fingers scraping reassurances over his scalp, chasing the sensation. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sorry,” he said, keeping his eyes closed, when he realized what he was doing. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do not be.” He shouldn’t be whispering but he was. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You seem to need this</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Or I do.</span>
  </em>
  
</p><p>
  <span>And that night, if Klinger so much as twitched, Charles was wide awake. It made him chuckle. </span>
  <span>“How do you do that, Major?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do what, Max?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You wake up if I wake up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Two reasons, I suppose.” Maxwell was amused to hear that, even sleep-deprived, Winchester sounded regal. “The first is that it has been a very long time since I slept next to someone.” </span>
  <em>
    <span>A small, delicate someone, at that, whose pretty frame I do not wish to crush. </span>
  </em>
  <span>“The second is that I care for you. If you are upset, I wish to be awake to help you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was more than anyone else had given Klinger in a long time. But he hated to be a burden almost as much as he loved to be touched. “I’m fine. Go to sleep, Charles.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I shall if you will do the same.” He smoothed the covers around the thinner man. “Unless you wish to talk?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max made a soft, exasperated sound. “You’re not gonna be happy until I see Sidney, are you?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I despise psychiatrists, Maxwell, so I will not send you to one unless you feel it is the proper course. I will listen, however. I only want to help.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was what he had wanted to do, too.  In the deepest part of the night, he said as much. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>To his credit, Charles listened. By the time he had heard the whole mess, he appeared as though he might shatter into a billion crystal shards. “Max… Max, I find I must return to my earlier query. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Why</span>
  </em>
  <span>?” </span>
  <em>
    <span>Why on Earth?</span>
  </em>
  
</p><p>
  <span>“You really need me to say it, sir?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I find that I do, for I can conceive of no reason…” </span>
  <em>
    <span>My dear, I am not and never have been worth it. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“For Tokyo, Major. For you. It was just a trade, that’s all. ‘Sposed to be, anyway.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And you hold yourself so cheap?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nah.” </span>
  <em>
    <span>I just think an awful lot of you. Get it? </span>
  </em>
  <span>Then, realizing that the Major probably wouldn’t like having the burden of his affection draped over his neck, he added, “You don’t have to worry about it, sir.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You do not get to say such a thing to me, Maxwell. You cannot sacrifice yourself in my name and then tell me not to worry over you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You barely even like me.” He hadn’t meant to say it; the words just popped out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is that so? I might have said as much of you before all this.” </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>I don’t like you. I don’t </span>
  </em>
  <b>
    <em>just</em>
  </b>
  <em>
    <span> like you</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Max… your mention of Tokyo… you intended </span>
  <em>
    <span>both of us </span>
  </em>
  <span>to be transferred, did you not?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No. What would I do in Tokyo?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Absurdly, he thought, </span>
  <em>
    <span>You are too lovely for a sacrifice, my dear girl</span>
  </em>
  <span>, before being shocked that he’d slipped into the feminine address and realizing that beauty was always a part of sacrifice. He’d seen crucifixes aplenty, little as he believed in them (less now); wasn’t Christ always lovely and fine limbed and often nearly erotic in his pain?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Max… I find I would like to hear how all this came about, if you would.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The smaller man gestured at the strange tableau they made. “Kinda hard to tell you no, considering.” Taking a deep breath, Max proceeded to make even more of a mess of the other man’s mind and heart as he proved that, exempting Honoria, he knew him better than anyone else. Maxwell walked him through his brazen and failed, failed, failed, mad, manic attempts to cope with his transfer, from amphetamines to booze to a stolen ambulance to nigh-suicidal heroism. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can’t stay here, sir.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles could see how he’d reached such a conclusion. But others had been as manic (Hawk) or as emotional (Margaret) or as filled with longing for other environs (BJ) and Max had not sought to rescue them. Because that was it, wasn’t it? “You were trying to rescue me, then?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I guess so. I thought he’d want something else, ta be honest, but…” He shrugged. “I didn’t… I mean, I don’t belong to anyone else. The gal I proposed to didn’t even want me. Not for keeps.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That hardly means you should throw yourself away!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max made a soft sound at him. “You’re the only person I ever met who can call me an idiot without </span>
  <em>
    <span>saying</span>
  </em>
  <span> it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was a stupid thing to do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I figured that out real fast. You can say the rest if you want.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What </span>
  <em>
    <span>rest</span>
  </em>
  <span>?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That it was stupid to fall for you, too.” He turned his face away, a feeble attempt at looking for a hiding place. “I knew it when it happened. All the reasons it couldn’t work. I tried to help it and I couldn’t.” </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Oh good Lord. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles wanted to wrench Klinger’s head around to search his eyes. He didn’t need to; he knew Max’s voice well enough - the man wasn’t lying. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He shook with sudden realization, with terrible pain. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Baby… </span>
  </em>
  <span>and he </span>
  <em>
    <span>never </span>
  </em>
  <span>thought common words like that. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Baby, </span>
  </em>
  <b>
    <em>no</em>
  </b>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The surgeon - educated to a beyond useful pitch, thought, then, of tragedies. </span>
  <em>
    <span>He </span>
  </em>
  <span>hadn’t made Maxwell into a sacrifice by any overt deed or ask… </span>
  <em>
    <span>But I bear some responsibility. I came here, though even </span>
  </em>
  <b>
    <em>that</em>
  </b>
  <em>
    <span> was not my choice, and your heart fastened on me. </span>
  </em>
  <span>He could conjure no reason why this should have happened. He was rarely even nice to Klinger. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I won you by some look or quality that you almost certainly invented wholecloth out of your own goodness… and you… </span>
  </em>
  <span>He couldn’t finish the thought. The only saving grace of the entire affair was that the act had been interrupted. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The act… he simply couldn’t wrap his mind around it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maxwell would have given himself away </span>
  <em>
    <span>in the name of Charles Emerson Winchester III</span>
  </em>
  <span>… and never said a word!? And Maxwell wasn’t Pierce. As far as Charles knew, the man hadn’t had any bedmates in Asia. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>I wish I was dead</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was a horrible thought, of course. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But less horrible than facing </span>
  <em>
    <span>this</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The notion of being sacrificed for as a friend had hurt him… this… </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You… you are in love with me?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not if it’s gonna make you cry.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was crying. He hadn’t even noticed. “My dear girl… you put on a gown the color of wisteria and walked into a monster’s cave </span>
  <b>for me</b>
  <span> and now you would spare me even the </span>
  <em>
    <span>knowledge</span>
  </em>
  <span> of your affection!? Did it never occur to you that I might wish you safe and well away from such a reprehensible man!?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I didn’t think you’d much care one way or the other, Major.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles hung his head. “That is the most terrible thing anyone has ever said to me, Maxwell. I would compliment you on outdoing even my father, but it presently hurts to breathe.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max sat up at that. It seemed that he owed Charles an apology, but he had no idea what he ought to apologize </span>
  <em>
    <span>for</span>
  </em>
  <span>. The Major had always held himself apart and he insulted him as easy as breathing. Klinger knew he didn’t mean it, mostly, but it went a long way to supporting the notion that his welfare wasn’t exactly high up on Charles’ list. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Sir?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“If I did not care for you </span>
  <em>
    <span>at all, </span>
  </em>
  <span>I would still wish better for you than that. However, I am your friend, you incredible idiot, and I would have asked, once, to be more than that if I could have imagined being welcomed.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Once?” he whispered. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Maxwell, I just had the unintentional authoring of one of the darker chapters of your young life. In your shoes, I could not find me deserving of friendship, let alone anything beyond it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You’d look ridiculous in my shoes, Charles. The ribbons, right?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Major gaped. Was Max </span>
  <em>
    <span>teasing</span>
  </em>
  <span>? How in the hell was he </span>
  <em>
    <span>capable</span>
  </em>
  <span>? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But you could pull my tiara off just fine, I think. Aren’t Winchesters basically royalty? And while you’re over there deciding what I’m gonna do, you should probably remember that I’m nicer than you are.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It is one of the things I cherish most about you, yes.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max hadn’t counted on such easy agreement. “You never said.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I…” he stopped because he sensed a trap. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Max’s eyes glittered. “You didn’t think it would matter if you did, huh? Makes all that ‘idiot’ stuff feel a little harsh, Major.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I could, ah, perhaps, be </span>
  <em>
    <span>your</span>
  </em>
  <span> idiot, then?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I still think it’d be better if you went back to Tokyo. Better for you.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“P’raps. But I have never tried to survive this place </span>
  <em>
    <span>with you.</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Kinda stupid of you, Harvard.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Agreed. So allow me to defer to your superior wisdom, my dear. How </span>
  <em>
    <span>do</span>
  </em>
  <span> we fix this?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I think… I think I’d be a lot less scared if you’d look after me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And I might feel more capable of drawing an easy breath with you in my arms.” He held them open. “If you would take your rightful place, my love?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He did. It felt like coming home. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Charles kissed his forehead and promised him that the only altar he wished for him hereafter would be the one before which they spoke their vows. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>End! </span>
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